My Dyslexia Experience

From the time when I was a little boy, growing up in Graves County, Kentucky, I have had problems with my reading and writing. Things never seemed to click for me, a trait that the teachers attributed to a mild case of dyslexia mixed with a healthy dose of attention deficit disorder. I knew, however, that no disorder was the cause of my distaste of reading and writing. Rather, there was nothing really interesting surrounding me that would grab my interest in the classroom. The teachers I encountered never took any interest in what their students wanted to read or write; they developed assignments based on what the curriculum, a course of study developed by some politicians at the Board of Education, told them to

My struggles grew or are growing into strengths, but before I could take on such a feat, I had to overcome dyslexia. Every day, I was reminded of my dyslexic mind when I read. Even when I was little I would cry because I didn’t want anyone to force me to read. I was not properly diagnosed with dyslexia until the fourth grade. I used to add or remove letters to the words I read. Instead of strawberry I may see it as stray merry. When I was eventually tested, I could see a large group of dots near the end of the slope. This meant I was above average in this area. However, there were two dots much further up on the slope, and these two dots were reading and spelling. My struggles began to show in third grade when we started reading independant novels. When I read, I had an extremely difficult time. When everyone started reading faster and more fluently than I did, I felt stupid. I truly believed their brains thought the same way mine did. I ended up doing twice the work just to maintain a good grade. I would come home from school exhausted. When I was in fourth grade, I really began to notice something else was going on in my brain. I was falling behind, reading ½ the words per minute than my friends. When we found out I had dyslexia, I was sent to the Key School. Here, I became slightly above average in fifth grade, then I became closer to where I should be in sixth grade, then this year, my reading has really taken off. I am able to read 165 words per minute, and my scores in reading vocabulary have skyrocketed. I am now scoring in the 12th grade level in reading vocabulary. From being below average, to being way above average, my reading skills have evolved immensely. Something else I struggled with has a similar story. This is my ability to

I’m a senior at the University of South Carolina Upstate and have been diagnosed with dyslexia since childhood. This label could have caused for a disastrous college experience, but there has always been something in myself pushing beyond the stigma.

Ever since I was young, I knew something was different about me. I’ve always had an active imagination and would write all kinds of stories, sometimes through pictures and sometimes through words. Not until I was in first grade did I notice my writing was different than my friends. It didn’t bother me though because I was too young to realize something was wrong; I was just different. One weekend, after playing restaurant with my mom and brother, my mom contacted my teacher to talk about some concerns she had with my reading and writing. She was told that I seemed to be progressing on an age-appropriate level with my peers and that nothing appeared to be wrong. But my mom persisted, and insisted that I be tested for a reading disability. My dad is dyslexic and my mom, knowing it can be passed down, was watching for the signs in my older brother first and now me. After testing, one of SV’s school psychologists announced that my results showed I had a learning disability. I then went to my pedestrian to talk about it and then to a special learning center in Sewickley for further

The teacher walked to the front of the room with her book in hand and as she got closer to the front, Paul got lower in his seat. He knew what was coming next; it was time for the class to read the next chapter. The teacher would start reading and then call on different students to read as they moved through the chapter. This scared Paul right down to his toes. He had read in front of the class before, but it was what followed after class that worried him the most. The taunts from the other students like “retard” or “are you stupid or what?” This type of relentless teasing would continue until gym class where he could hold his own ground again. He did not have any problems in gym; class he was good at sports

I am a student that has had to work hard for as long as I can remember in achieving my goals, dreams, both personal as well as academically. After many years of testing, I was diagnosed with dyslexia in my sophomore year of high school. Dyslexia is a congenital language process disorder. It can hinder reading, writing, spelling and sometimes speaking. Dyslexia is not a sign of poor intelligence

Due to phonemic awareness, which is concerning or involving the discrimination of distinctive speech elements of a language, speaking and spelling words is difficult at times. This can cause dyslexic children to have a hard time in social situations. According to Artemisa Shehu, Eralda Zhilla, and Eglantina Dervishi in their essay “the impact of the quality of social relationships on self-esteem of children with dyslexia”, about 5% of primary school children in the U.S. have communication problems and 3.8% of children aged 8-11 have a phonological problem. At around this age, kids become more self-conscious about what they do or how they look. If a child cannot read or speak very well and gets picked on about it, their self-esteem is harmed. This is challenging, because if a child is not helped, they will think the dyslexia is their fault. In the same essay it states, “Dyslexia is a problem that makes the child feel ashamed, because they cannot perform the task properly and it makes the child feel incompetent in the eyes of parents, feel lazy in front of teachers, feel stupid in the eyes of friends, and guilty at the sight of them” (Shehu, Zhilla, and Dervishi). These children with learning disabilities usually get named as “special” children with “special” needs. A young child trying to fit in with their peers finds it very difficult when they are constantly thought of as

From a young age Stephen was told that he wouldn't amount to much in life. His teacher's flunked him in first grade and fourth grade and was asked to leave the school so he transferred to a new school. He then flunked tenth grade and once again was asked to leave so you would also think that this kid wouldn't amount to much in life.

However, I refuse to let it hold me back. English homework that takes classmates thirty minutes to do takes me twice as long. When teachers ask students to read out loud, I never raise my hand because of fear I’ll mess up. I slump down in my chair praying the teacher doesn’t call on me. Instead, I participate in other ways like answering questions teachers pose to the class. When people ask what it’s like to have dyslexia, I try to explain, but there’s nothing I can say that will allow them to truly understand. Often, I share one of my earliest memories. In preschool, we were learning the difference between right and left. The teacher kept saying your left hand is the one that makes an “L.” I stood there staring at my hands in confusion. I didn’t know which way “L” faced. It’s hard for those who haven’t experienced this to fully comprehend the obstacles I’ve had to overcome to get where I am.

According to the Dyslexia & Learning Disability Centre in Las Vegas, Dyslexia is an ability within the sensory mechanism of the nervous system to perceive the world with a multidimensional view. However it comes with poor word reading, word decoding, oral reading fluency and spelling. Though with appropriate teaching methods, dyslexic individuals can learn successfully throughout their lives. Also, when properly trained and informed, a dyslexic can use their

I believe that my learning disability of dyslexia,that caused me some difficulty in grade school,has shown me an appreciation for discipline.AT times learning was hard for me,and at times I was not motivated.Many times my difficulties also caused me to work harder to overcome,the disability,to master a subject.I found this true in math,where I had a very hard time in the fourth grade learning long division,and advanced multiplication.Sometimes my overcompensating effort caused me to excel.I believe that my experiences as an adult,and my Christian faith has matured me and helped me in these learning areas,and I see the point of learning certain subjects more clearly.I can see the forest for the trees better.The learning disability has helped

Some of us in the world may have problems with reading, spelling, and other academics. You might not know why they cannot read or spell as well as you can because they have a disorder. This disorder is called dyslexia. People with dyslexia struggle with: listening, reading, writing, spelling, and even handwriting. However, having dyslexia doesn’t mean that they are not intelligent. Some of the greatest minds in the world have or had dyslexia. One of the most fascinating reasons for dyslexia is the dominate ear. Even though they may be different doesn’t mean that they are stupid. (Hotz, Sollier)

Growing, developing and learning are the facts of life for all children. Each day children are faced with many new concepts and various challenges. Can you imagine how it feels for a child to face not only new challenges life has, but to face these challenges while living with a learning disability? These challenges are met not just when they begin school either. Students suffer from learning disabilities from the moment they begin learning, not when they start school. Learning disabilities are real and they affect millions of people. “One such disability that affects over approximately 15 percent of the total American population is dyslexia” ( Nosek 5).

Things happen sometimes in an unexpected way to bring the best out in ourselves. I know that I am a part of the millions of people that have dyslexia but every dyslexia is different because it affects people differently and the effect it had on me was that it gave me a lot of anxiety and uncertainty of success. Fortunately I was diagnosed with the dyslexia in the second grade and had time and faith to overcome the obstacles that dyslexia brought into my life.

One of my primary focuses was to find out how different literatures dealt with Dyslexia and how best to support the child. Dyslexia can be described from a number of different perspectives as we see in Ball et al (2007) who explain that it can be “how one learns (Cognition), what parts of the brain are involved (neurology), what genes are involved (genetics) and behaviour (p14). Their book entitled ‘Dyslexia: An Irish perspective’ is very relevant to my research as it gives a great insight into the history of the special education sector in Ireland. It also looks into some of the key debates that are facing the educational sector today.